Musical notation



UNIT D STATES PATENT OE IcE.

CHARLES C. GUILFORD, OF BOSTON, MASSACHUSETTS.

MUSICAL NOTATION.

SPECIFIGATION forming part of Letters Patent No. 608,771, dated August 9, 1898.

(Application filed June 8, 1897, Serial N0. 839,795, (NO model.)

To all whom it may concern:

Be it known that I, CHARLES C. GUILFORD, of Boston, in the county of Suffolk and State of Massachusetts, have invented certain new and useful Improvements in Musical Notation, of which the following is a description sulliciently full, clear, and exact to enable those skilled in the art to which it appertains or with which it is most nearly connected to make and use the same.

My invention consists of certain novel improvements in musical notation, and has for its object to provide a simple and rational means by which composers may adequately express their conceptions and to secure a more perfect correspondence between musical notation and the system of music which musical notation is intended to express.

The system of music now in vogue recognizes a scale of twelve intervals; but the notation by which that scale is expressed is based upon a scale of but seven intervals. To express the additional five intervals (those corresponding to the black keys of the pianokeyboarch) recourse is had to a perplexing and irrational system of sharps, flats, and naturals. It thus happens that the same tone has many different symbols. Furthermore, while the compass of a staff is less than one and one-third octaves the range of musical tones is more than seven octaves. This necessitates the use of a greater or less number of leger-lines above and below the staff, thus needlessly increasing the work of composition for the type-setter, besides consuming a large part of the page for only a few measures of the music, and, worse than all, it adds greatly to the difficulty of reading the music itself.

The present notation is just as defective in its means for expressing time as it is in its means for expressing pitch. Thus while the real unit of time is the measure the present notation attempts to make the note the unit, which results in the manifest absurdity of a measure or unit being composed of two, three, or four quarter-notes or eighth-notes, as the case may be. Not only is this illogical, but

it results in the practical difficulty of requiring a different note-symbol for every possible variation in the duration of a tone and of a different rost-syn1b0l for every variation in the duration of silence. ception of musical time is that of accent or stress rather than of duration or meter. The present system of notation does not express this idea with certainty and precision.

With a View to overcoming the above deficiencies, crudities, and other faults as well I have devised a new notation which affords a simple and adequate means for expressing pitch, accent, and duration, which are the elements of modern music.

In the drawings, Figure 1 is a representation of a piano-keyboard to which are applied the symbols which I employ as the means for expressing pitch, the Roman numerals above the keyboard denoting the respective octaves or tone series in which the note is intended to be played, while the Arabic numerals below serve to denote the individual note of each octave or series. Fig. 2 illustrates the means which I employ forexpressing accent in duple time; Fig. 3, the means for expressing accent in triple time; Fig. 4, the means for expressing accent in sextuple time. Fig. 5 illustrates the means which I employ to subdivide a beat or pulse into its parts. Fig. 6 illustrates the application of mynotation to express the music for the wellknown composition, Home, Sweet Home, the iirst four and the last fourmeasures only being written. Fig. 7 illustrates the means which I employ for denoting triplets, quintuplets, and septuplets, respectively.

I will now describe in detail the novel no tation which I have devised as a means for expressing music.

The modern con-- Pitch-The octave is the limit of every I graduated tone series. I designate the respective octaves by Roman numerals. Thus the octave beginning with the lowest 0 is denoted by the Roman numeral II, the next octave above by the symbol III, the next by the symbol IV, and the highest by the symbol VIII. Each octave contains a graduated se ries of twelve tones, which I designate, rcspectively, 1 2 3 4. 5 6 7 S 9 1O 11 12. \Vhen but a few notes are to be played above or below the given octave, I prefer not to change the Roman numeral, but merely to add one, two, or three marks above a numeral to in" dicate that it is to be played one, two, or three octaves, respectively, higher than writteenths by means of hyphens.

ten. For example, V11 2 3 indicates that 1, 2, and 3 are to be played or sung in the fifth octave, VIIQ 3 in the sixth octave, VII; 3

in the seventh octave, and VII 2 3 in the eighth octave. In the same manner these marks placed below the note merely signify that the note is to be played, respectively, one, two, or three octaves lower than written. Thus VII 2 3 indicates that 1, 2, and 3 are to be played in the second octave. Where several different voices or instruments are to be heard, aRoman numeral must be used before the part written for each voice or instrument.

Accent-I express accent or rhythm by means of vertical lines, the heavylines denoting the primary or strong accent, the lighter lines denoting the secondary or weak accent. I have shown in Figs. 2, 3, and 4 of the drawings the means which I employ to express accent in duple,triple,and sextuple time,respectively. Each primary accent is counted one. The secondary accents indicated by the light vertical lines are counted two, three,four,&c. according to the number of them employed. Just as from one strong accent to the next constitutes a complete measure or unit of rhythm, so in my notation from one heavy vertical line to the next one indicates a complete measure.

Duratiom-The light vertical lines subdivide the measure into beats or counts of equal duration, the number of beats or counts in a measure corresponding to the number of subdivisions or spaces between two successive heavy lines. For example, one light vertical line between two heavy ones divides that space into two subdivisions and indicates duple time; two light vertical lines divide the space into three subdivisions, indicating three beats to the measure, or what is known as triple time, and so on. These spaces or subdivisions may be of unequal width as printed on the sheet in order to receive a greater or less number of note-symbols; but it is to be understood that the values or duration which they express are equal. Thus in Fig. 5 the space between, the two heavy lines is divided into two very unequal subdivisions by the light line, yet the duration of each count corresponding to these subdivisions is exactly the same.

WVhen unaccented tones are used, I employ punctuation-marks to subdivide the spaces between two adjacent vertical lines, representing beats or counts, into parts. As shown in Fig. 5, I employa period to divide the pulse into halves. These halves I subdivide into quarters by means of colons. The quarters I subdivide into eighths by commas, and these eighths may be again subdivided into six- The hyphen only is used for triplets, quintuplets, and septuplets, (T and the like. Intermediate time lengths or duration, such as are sometimes found in graces, ornaments, and cadenzas, may be indicated by the apostrophe, although it is desirable that the composers meaning should be definitely shown. A tone is first heard in that part of the count where the numeral representing it is placed and is to be continued until succeeded by the symbol of another tone or terminated by the symbol of silence, ("*i) Silence continues until terminated by a symbol of tone, (a numeral.) Silence is denoted by the asterisk, I employ double vertical lines H to mark the beginning or end of the phrase or period, as illustrated in Fig. 6.

It will be observed that I have devised a complete means for adequately expressingthe ideas of pitch, accent, and duration Without the use of any staff whatever, the notesymbol itself being made to express pitch absolutely; that I employ a single uniform series of note-symbols, each note havingits own distinctive symbol and one symbol only for each note; that all variation in the note-symbol to express time is dispensed with and the measure itself is made the unit of rhythm, and that the use of all so-called accidentals is rendered wholly unnecessary.

The practical advantage of my notation in the mechanical work of preparing the sheetmusic, and more especially in lightening the burden of the novice in the study of music, as Well as in the matter of affording to composers a flexible and scientific vehicle for the expression of their conceptions is obvious.

It is apparent that changes may be made in the specific symbols which I employ as a means for expressing the various elements of music without departing from the spirit of my invention.

What I claim is 1. The herein-described notation, comprising a Roman numeral; a series of Arabic numerals arranged in a horizontal line; heavy and light lines dividing said numerals into groups; punctuation-marks for the subdivision of said groups of numerals; and an asterisk to denote silence; as a means for expressing musical composition.

2. A musical notation comprising indexnumerals corresponding to the several octaves or tone series, a series of numerals corresponding to the respective tones or degrees of the chromatic scale, each degree being expressed by a distinctive numeral, vertical dividinglines arranged in proper order to denote-accent, and punctuation-marks for subdividing the accents.

In testimony whereof I have signed my name to this specification, in the presence of two subscribing witnesses, this 7th day of June, A. D. 1897.

CHARLES C. GUILFORD.

WVitnesses:

GEO. N. GODDARD, ARTHUR W. ORossLnY.

IlO 

